


A "Day Off"

by ShadowsOffense



Category: The Avengers (Marvel Movies), The Avengers (Marvel) - All Media Types
Genre: Gen, Prompt Fill
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-08-21
Updated: 2013-08-21
Packaged: 2017-12-24 06:23:31
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 611
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/936446
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ShadowsOffense/pseuds/ShadowsOffense
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Maria Hill's day off is the day she has to actually work to keep her cover.  Thankfully, they don't happen very often.</p>
            </blockquote>





	A "Day Off"

On Maria’s “day off” she picks up her dry cleaning, goes by the bank, gets her hair trimmed, and sometimes meets a friend or two for lunch or goes to a movie. She never sees a doctor, dentist, or takes her car into the shop because it’s deemed too much of a risk, but she pretends to do all of these things as well, when occasion demands.

Today, the dry cleaning has come to 23.89 because she had an extra shirt and when she checks she sees that they have done a good job getting the coffee out of her blouse. Details like that are important. She takes the clothes she never wears “home” and hangs them carefully in the closet in case she is being watched.

Next, she stands in line at the bank and afterward tells her stylist, Karyn, a few vague, somewhat fake details about the lunch date she will be meeting just after she’s done here. To be precise, they had planned, through unsecure means, to meet at 13:00, but Maria knows that this appointment will make her 15 minutes late.

It actually ends up making her 17 minutes late because Karyn takes a little longer than expected to finish rehashing the football game last night (1-5 Ravens, Karyn blamed the weather, but, actually, it was Glen Daveson’s bad knee, which he is still hiding the truth about from everyone but his kid sister). Maria makes a mental note to add extra delays to Karyn’s file until Daveson is benched and wishes that she hadn’t already factored speeding because she’s late into her time table. She thinks, briefly, that she might be missing the point, but a lot of people could die in two minutes. 

Besides, she _likes_ clockwork precision.

At her request, the Agent playing her friend this afternoon is Romanova. She’d rather have had Coulson; she wanted to get a bead on Stark’s current state of mind and of the two undercover agents they have in place with him, Coulson was the one who wouldn’t be able to hide that telling, tiny tinge of emotion on his face. The man had an impressive veneer of gentle banality, and nothing ever showed in his voice, but there was a slight tension in his neck and jaw that would be telling if present. Romanova’s facade wasn’t just a brick wall, or Fort Knox, she didn’t have to go blank like Maria did; the woman had _depth_ , she had layers, you could glimpse behind her mask and still only see what she wanted you to see.

It was a good thing she was on their side, but it never paid to trust anybody in this business. 

So, Maria would have rather had Coulson for the debriefing, but she’d asked for Romanova. Because Romanova was the best and that was what Maria wanted in the field. 

She’d meet with Coulson later, for confirmation.

They have a nice lunch. Romanova is as impressive as always, although, apparently, Stark isn’t. Maria isn’t ready to make a call yet though, Fury’s interests have a way of paying off in the long run and she trusts his judgment. He has a bad habit of being right.

She spends the rest of the afternoon napping and listening to opera, which isn’t bad as afternoons go, if dull. Sometimes she wonders if she’d have really looked forward to days like this if she had chosen a normal life and a normal job; the idea seems unbearable. Maria can’t wait to get back to the real parts of her work. 

She wouldn’t have minded being able to own a pet though. She likes dogs.


End file.
